Scoop Column: The Politics Of Disintegration

Scoop's West Coast correspondent John Howard finds
lessons in Bill Clinton's musings on Quebec and East Timor
for New Zealand's increasingly embattled West
Coasters.

As NZ politicians yet again make promises
over the South Island's West Coast, US President Bill
Clinton, speaking in Quebec Friday said, where there are
dissatisfied groups in sections of countries, we should look
to ways to satisfy those anxieties and legitimate complaint
without disintegration.

In 1995, Quebec province came
close to voting to split away from Canada following
frustration with the Canadian federal system. Lucien
Bouchard's Quebec provincial government, dedicated to
independence, was re-elected less than a year ago.

Clinton
said, " It is better for nations to work out problems with
unhappy segments of their societies than to allow those
factions to break away."

Referring to East Timor he said,
" Does it mean East Timor was wrong to break away from
Indonesia? No. But wouldn't it have been better if they
could have found their religious, their cultural, their
ethnic and their economic footing in genuine self-government
in the framework of a larger entity, which would also have
supported them economically."

Clinton is right, but for
years New Zealand politicians have all been talking but
nobody's listening.

Take the West Coast where I have lived
for four years. The total land area is an equivalent
distance between Auckland and Wellington, yet there is just
35,000 people.

Nevertheless, the West Coast is expected to
function exactly the same as every other area of New Zealand
and comply with the ever-growing number of laws which are
not funded by Central Government. In other words, unfunded
mandates.

Since the 1989 local government amalgamations,
over 90 functions which central government used to do must
now be done by local authorities; without any money from
government to do it.

That's not unique to the West Coast,
but to be expected to exercise that many extra functions
with just 35,000 people is totally ridiculous, unreasonable
and unfair. It's also not good or responsible
government.

Coaster's know they possess New Zealand's
"crown jewels" in a pristine environment - unlike other
areas of New Zealand it still exists. But is it fair for New
Zealander's to expect 35,000 Coaster's to be the conscience
and carry the financial burden for the rest of the
country?

The last thing most Coaster's want to do is cut
down trees but they are scared for their future and their
jobs. For the most part it's all they have.

Why is it, for
example, that elsewhere in the world native trees which have
fallen naturally in the forests and national-parks are able
to be carefully extracted and milled? But not in New Zealand
- we just leave them to rot. Why is it that government
authorities recently sawed into pieces a beautiful large
rimu tree which was alive when toppled onto a state-highway
from a wind-storm? What a stupid policy! - what a waste of
resource!

But when, over the years, people are continually
misled by politicians, unsupported and get backed into a
corner something has got to give.

Last month's angry
display where Labour's Deputy Leader, Michael Cullen, had
eggs thrown at him, was shouted down and had his car rocked
was not the West Coast way. Anybody who has visited the
Coast will attest to that. But it was anger born out of
years of frustration. Exactly the same frustration which
exists in Quebec against the Canadian central
government.

For years our government has taken coal levies
amounting to $3 million annually from West Coast coal.
That's not being returned. When the ports were privatised
West Coast council's, unlike other councils, got no shares.
Without the income from those shares other councils around
New Zealand would have to double their general rate.

Is it
fair, then, that West Coast Regional Council ratepayer's pay
double those of other regional council ratepayers and with
incomes lower than the national average?

There is
certainly a strong feeling of a West Coast community of
interest. A 1996 Local Government Commission report put it
another way. In its report entitled Investigation Into the
Structure of Local Government On the West Coast it said,
"The Commission likewise sees a political difficulty within
a region, with a strong pioneering and development bias, in
being able to ensure the election to a unitary authority of
councillors who would be prepared to take a firm line on the
preservation of the environment."

But that was in 1996 and
things are changing, but perhaps not fast enough for the
rest of New Zealand. It is also unhelpful when political
rhetoric, expediency and grandstanding gets in the way of
fair play.

I worry about Labour's proposal for an Economic
Development Trust in lieu of the West Coast sustainable
beech logging scheme. If people are appointed, or elected,
to that trust who still retain "a strong pioneering and
development bias" and who are not "prepared to take a firm
line on the environment" then the final outcome may not be
what New Zealand and the world needs or expects.

It's
always important, when you have found a problem, to find a
solution. And there are balanced solutions. Trouble is,
everybody's talking at each other rather than too each other
- and then nobody listens. That is a recipe for Bill
Clinton's disintegration.

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